Béla Bartók (1881-1945)
14 Bagatelles (Tizennégy bagatell zongorára), Sz.38 op. 6
Trois chansons populaires hongroises de Csík (Három csíkmegyei népdal), Sz.35a

Zoltán Kodály (1882-1967)
Sept pièces pour piano (Hét zongoradarab) op. 11
Dances of Marosszék (Marosszéki táncok)

Valentina Tóth, piano

Passionnée de musique hongroise, la jeune pianiste Valentina Tóth propose un récital qui sort des sentiers battus. Les Quatorze Bagatelles sont une étape capitale dans la production de Béla Bartók. Kodály les qualifia de « renaissance de la mélodie et du rythme ». Cette œuvre implique mainte découverte future et revêt parfois un caractère expérimental tout en étant de l’admirable musique. Les Sept Pièces pour piano de Zoltan Kodály sont placées sous le signe de pénibles tourments, des déchirements et du drame. L’élément populaire n’y est pas moins abondamment présent, à travers de nombreux thèmes pentatoniques. Enfin, toujours de Kodály, les Danses de Marosszek sont la mouture pianistique d’une œuvre prévue pour orchestre. Le matériau thématique est constitué de mélodies populaires de Transylvanie. La lecture de Valentina Tóth se caractérise par un toucher mœlleux qui arrondit les angles, un climat mélancolique sans être dépressif, le poids juste pour chaque note, des fulgurances parfaitement intégrées. L’interprète cherche moins à briser les lignes qu’à les suspendre ou les caresser. (Patrick Guettman)

“Music is a language everyone understands. When you communicate through music, there are no misunderstandings, there is no confusion.” That could be the artistic motto of Valentina Tóth (18) – a young and highly promising pianist, a multi-talent who sings, dances, acts and plays the piano at an exceptionally high level. In 2009 she won first prize in the Princess Christina Piano Competition and her career has been on the up and up ever since. Skyrocketing. She just finished secondary school and is studying at the Royal Conservatoire in The Hague, but already she has been on the stage at Carnegie Hall, and she is releasing her first CD. For her first album Valentina Tóth decided to do her favourite repertoire: Bartók and Kodály. A musical coming home. And take that coming home quite literally, because Valentina is three-eighths Hungarian and five-eighths Dutch; she grew up in a house opposite the church in a village in Friesland. “A long time ago, my grandfather left Hungary and came to the Netherlands to study law and theology. In my parents’ house I often heard Hungarian folk music. I thought it was something truly special. I was fascinated by the different tempo, the different expression in that music. I think that is how I became so very attached to the work of Bartók and Kodály. Hungarian music is emotional and impulsive. Just like the Hungarians. I see that in my father, but a bit in myself too. That music feels so very familiar. It’s hard to explain why I play it the way I do. I want to play it the way I feel it.” The Bagatelles, Op. 6, written in 1908, are an important link in the work of Bartók. In them it first become clear how hard the composer was working to find his own super-personalised musical language. The work dates from the time when Bartók seriously started to collect and document Hungarian folk music. Bartók was able to take something that had been around ages (Hungarian folk music) and make something entirely new out of it.